In plasma-based deposition processing, the importance of low-energy ion bombardment during thin film growth can hardly be exaggerated. Ion bombardment is an important physical tool available to materials scientists in the design of new materials and new structures. Glow discharges and in particular the magnetron sputtering discharge have the advantage that the ions of the discharge are abundantly available to the deposition process. However, the ion chemistry is usually dominated by the ions of the inert sputtering gas while ions of the sputtered material are rare. Over the past few years, various ionized sputtering techniques have appeared that can achieve a high degree of ionization of the sputtered atoms, often up to 50 % but in some cases as much as approximately 90%. This opens a complete new perspective in the engineering and design of new thin film materials. The development and application of magnetron sputtering systems for ionized physical vapor deposition (IPVD) is reviewed. The application of a secondary discharge, inductively coupled plasma

We noticed that Figures 1 and 2 of the original publication showed data of preliminary measurements that are not quite consistent with the text and figure captions.We regret this mistake and provide here the correct figures.

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Influence of high temperature on solid state nuclear track detector parameters Rev. Sci. Instrum. 83, 093502 (2012) Comparative band alignment of plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposited high-k dielectrics on gallium nitride J. Appl. Phys. 112, 053710 (2012) In situ transmission electron microscopy study of dielectric breakdown of surface oxides during electric fieldassisted sintering of nickel nanoparticles Appl. Phys. Lett. 101, 093107 (2012) Excimer laser ablation of thick SiOx-films: Etch rate measurements and simulation of the ablation threshold An excellent adhesion of hard coatings to steel substrates is paramount in practically all application areas. Conventional methods utilize Ar glow etching or cathodic arc discharge pretreatments that have the disadvantage of producing weak interfaces or adding droplets, respectively. One tool for interface engineering is high power impulse magnetron sputtering ͑HIPIMS͒. HIPIMS is based on conventional sputtering with extremely high peak power densities reaching 3 kW cm −2 at current densities of Ͼ2 A cm −2 . HIPIMS of Cr and Nb was used to prepare interfaces on 304 stainless steel and M2 high speed steel ͑HSS͒. During the pretreatment, the substrates were biased to U bias = −600 V and U bias = −1000 V in the environment of a HIPIMS of Cr and Nb plasma. The bombarding flux density reached peak values of 300 mA cm −2 and consisted of highly ionized metal plasma containing a high proportion of Cr 1+ and Nb 1+ . Pretreatments were also carried out with Ar glow discharge and filtered cathodic arc as comparison. The adhesion was evaluated for coatings consisting of a 0.3 m thick CrN base layer and a 4 m thick nanolayer stack of CrN / NbN with a period of 3.4 nm, hardness of HK 0.025 = 3100, and residual stress of −1.8 GPa. For HIPIMS of Cr pretreatment, the adhesion values on M2 HSS reached scratch test critical load values of L C = 70 N, thus comparing well to L C = 51 N for interfaces pretreated by arc discharge plasmas and to L C = 25 N for Ar etching. Cross sectional transmission electron microscopy studies revealed a clean interface and large areas of epitaxial growth in the case of HIPIMS pretreatment. The HIPIMS pretreatment promoted strong registry between the orientation of the coating and polycrystalline substrate grains due to the incorporation of metal ions and the preservation of crystallinity of the substrate. Evidence and conditions for the formation of cube-on-cube epitaxy and axiotaxy on steel and ␥-TiAl substrates are presented.

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